Graduate student Abby Armstrong has been a curatorial intern at Marquette University’s Haggerty Museum of Art this spring semester. During her time with the Haggerty, she has had the opportunity to experience the real, day-to-day job of working as a private museum registrar. During this semester, Abby has been helping the Haggerty begin the reorganization of their accession file system, concentrating on the rights and reproductions of the works in their permanent and study collections.

Abby has participated in exhibition meetings, and is really excited to have the opportunity to curate a small selection of George Rouault’s Miserere series, that opens August 2016. Georges Rouault’s Miserere is of the Haggerty’s most impressive complete print series in their permanent collection. These fifty-eight prints illustrate Rouault’s concern and obsession with the suffering of man and horrors of living in post-WWI France. These pieces illustrate Rouault’s focus on the grotesque while relating man’s suffering to the passion of Christ and the redemption and salvation that can be achieved through this misery. Her exhibition will focus on a smaller selection of prints that draw attention to the French Romantic investment in the Medieval past, and how Rouault’s prints speak to the theme of Neo-Medievalism. This arrangement of prints will showcase Rouault’s intense participation with medieval symbolism and devotional imagery. Throughout the exhibit, viewers will observe Rouault’s medieval inspiration at work, while admiring his complicated artistic process.

She will be continuing with the Haggerty throughout this summer, and is really excited to participate in the installation of her first curated show!